


To the Last

by Meshele



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-04
Updated: 2017-09-04
Packaged: 2018-12-23 14:56:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11992104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meshele/pseuds/Meshele
Summary: FL/LL challenge on TFN, summer 2007.





	To the Last

**Author's Note:**

> This was originally posted in 2007, I believe in July, on TFN, for the FL/LL challenge in 2007 - I'd have to go back and check to be exactly sure when. The board conversion ate something like half the story, and it was the last piece of fanfiction I wrote and posted. I found a stockpile of old work, and figured I may as well post it, if for no other reason than nostalgia's sake - and how much I miss us few Jaina/Zekk shippers and the nonsense we got up to - may we all have improved from the writing we were doing 10 years ago, but may we enjoy it as much if not more than we did then!
> 
> Plus, AO3 only lists 17 fics for this ship, and it makes me sad. Especially after the last time I dug through the old lists on TFN and the broken links and stories missing pieces kinda hit me like punch to the gut. 
> 
> I think I pulled out all the old code... I hope. 
> 
> ETA: Apparently I changed the title right before I posted. Huh. And it was posted July 18th, 2007, originally!

Title: Fight in Time

Author: Meshele

Timeframe: post DN (?) AU

Genre:  Angst, mush?

Characters: Jaina, Zekk

Summary: First love/last love summer 2007 challenge, quote from [Dazed and Confiscated](http://boards.theforce.net/beyond_the_saga/b10477/26462233/p1/?9) by Vongchild, challenge quote in **bold**!

  
  


In the corner of the hanger bay a man stood, hunched over, dark hair falling into his face beneath his hooded robe.  He had not wanted this "mission," as Luke called it -- he felt more like a glorified spy, and nothing more.  Sure, he was home, but it little resembled the city-planet he scavenged for so many years. He surveyed the dark hanger once more before falling into a sitting position, tired after two days of sitting and waiting for a sign.  He knew he was on the right planet, and he knew this was where the captured Jedi would be: it was only a matter of time -- the last thing in the galaxy he could spare. 

"How about you and me --"

 

Before he blinked, his lightsaber was drawn and at the female's throat. 

 

"What," he hissed, "do you want?"  Silently he chided himself for not sensing her presence earlier, and for allowing such a distraction.  As little as he knew about this mission, he knew it was of utmost importance that he be alert, and find the missing Jedi.

 

She let her eyes follow the first bead of sweat forming on his head as it traveled down his pale cheek, and disappeared behind his robe. 

 

He could hear the _click-click_  of space boots on the floor before he sensed her.  _Her.  She was not supposed to be here -- unless..._  He could only hope that he was wrong.  Her lack of comm. calls the past few months weren't strange, after all.  But there were times, so many times, when he could feel something wrong through the force, but could put no name to the cause.  It didn't help that she let their connection die, and in spite of his protests and attempts to strengthen it when she wasn't paying attention.  He knew the joiner Killik situation had been far from ideal -- and being forced to feel her _love_  for a certain cardboard cut-out strained them more than ever before; worse, even than his fall to the dark --

 

"You know, you're much more attractive when you're fighting yourself than sitting it that corner moping."

 

"I didn't ask you."  He glared at her.  "What, exactly, do you want from me?"  When she didn't answer, he sighed and threw her to the ground as he deactivated his lightsaber, and turned to resume his post. 

 

"I wouldn't do that if I were you," the female half sang as she got up, and danced away from his corner.  It was then he finally looked up into the dark center of the hanger, where the shadows danced around a small transport called -- _danced?_  he thought.  _Shadows don't dance..._

 

As he watched, the shadows began to define themselves into shapes, human shapes.  He tried to draw on the force to heighten his vision, but found his connection to the force almost gone. He fought his gut feeling that the entire mission was a set-up, forcing himself to stand and fall into a meditative stance in an attempt to feel the force more acutely, but would leave him free and ready to strike if necessary. 

 

The force was not with him that day.  He could not sense her presence anymore.

 

"Let me go!" The voice was familiar, like one he hadn't heard in a long, long time.  But it lacked its usual strength, and though fighting words, there was no fight behind them. 

 

"Jaina?"  he whispered to the dark.  The shadows tensed.  He cursed himself again, he had lost the element of surprise before he knew it was his. 

 

"Vent crawler?"

 

He could see her, now.  Jaina was lying suspended between two of her captors, another hovering over her, ready to strike at the first sign of a fight.  She offered a faint smile in his direction.  "Well, don't just stand there!" she said.  "At least kill the ysalamari." 

 

_Well.  At least that explains the Force problems, and why I couldn't sense her,_  he thought, as his lightsaber sprang to life for the second time that night with a _snap-hiss_ in mid-spin to deflect several shots from her captors.  _Now, to find the ysalamari_   With the grim determination of a man who set out to save his first and only love, he took one step forward, then another, until he found himself surrounded.  He barely noticed the sting of a stray shot on his arm, he could only feel her slipping away from him again -- that much remained of their killik bond in such close proximity.  He said a silent prayer to the force before coming face-to-face with _them_.  They were not, as had been feared, a new order of Sith warriors come to balance the ever-growing Jedi.  No.  These were worse -- those who would stop at nothing to see the Jedi and Sith alike cast into the shadows so their new, more perfect world order could take place of the fragile order that was left in the galaxy. 

 

He looked the nearest one in the eye.  "Let her go."

 

_The guard on the ramp._   The thought came unbidden. 

 

The leader hissed from inside the ship, "Never, Jedi." It was all he needed to hear.  He jumped over the still form, and its guardians and raced to the ramp.  He saw before he sensed the cadge that housed the ysalamari in the guard's hands.  In one deft movement, he cut the cadge from the man's hands, and speared the force-supressor. 

 

*     *     *

He hit the switch on this lightsaber to deactivate it, depriving the hangar bay of all light.  The ysalamari were dead.  Those who imprisoned Jaina were captives in their own ship.  He fell to the ground beside her, taking her in his arms.  He didn’t notice the tears he shed as he buried his face in her hair, his silent sobs shaking them both. 

His comm. unit beeped.  He resisted the urge to throw the unit into the hull of the ship. 

“Jedi Zekk,” he said.

“Zekk.”  The Grandmaster said nothing more.  Zekk knew that Jaina’s uncle knew she was with him, or at least had found out once the ysalamari had been killed.

“Grandmaster,” he started, “I have the missing Jedi here with me.  Her captors are currently prisoners aboard their ship.”

“Good, Zekk.  Who are the Jedi?”

Zekk almost choked.  “Jaina, sir.  She’s the only one I have found so far.”

“How long have you been searching, Jedi.”  It wasn’t a question: it was a statement, an accusation.

“About three minutes.  I only just --” he searched for the right word “--resolved this conflict.”

“Bring her home, Zekk,”

“But sir!  What about the other missing Jedi?”  Zekk could not understand why in nine Corellian Hells Luke would forsake the safety of anyone else involved –

“Jedi Zekk.”

“Yes?”

“My niece was the only missing Jedi.”

*          *          *

Jaina woke to the nauseating feeling of being immersed in a bacta tank.  Beyond the curved edges of her tank, she saw what appeared to be a pile of breathing robes.  _But robes don’t…_   Her confusion was momentarily put aside as the tank drained itself, and she was allowed out. 

Before she could turn and stumble, a pair of strong arms held her, a piece of absorbent cloth in his hands. 

 

“Zekk,” she breathed.  “This feels familiar, doesn’t it?” 

 

He laughed.  “You mean like the time you had the worst sunburn the galaxy has ever seen?” he said, his eyes gleaming -- she’d always loved his green eyes, first as a child, then as a teenager – _loved?_. 

 

“Easy, there, Jay.  Really that anxious to be back in that tank?”  He flashed her another grin, “Or is the company not to your liking?”

 

“Quiet, flyboy,” she said as he helped her walk into the hall. 

 

“Or are you mad because it was your turn to rescue me?”

 

Jaina pretended to glare at her friend.  “Oh, I think I can let it slide this time, vent crawler,” she said.  “But only this time”

 

Zekk stopped in front of one of the many door in the hall. “Your room, m’lady,” he said as he let go of her and bowed, opening the door with the Force.  Jaina only shook her head, a smile tugging her lips as she muttered something that sounded like "show-off." 

 

“Oh, good.  She’s here.”  A healer walked over to Jaina, effectively stopping a potential tirade of "insults" aimed towards her tall companion.  “Take a seat, please, Jedi Solo.”  When Jaina made no move to sit, the healer grabbed her arm, and nearly shoved the petite Jedi onto the bed. 

 

Zekk couldn’t contain his laughter, and held on to the door frame for support.  “Goddess, you sh-should see your face!”  he howled. 

 

“Just get you and your sorry excuse of a lightsaber over here, nerf herder.”

 

“Sorry excuse?”  He quirked an eyebrow at her, “You mean the sorry excuse of a lightsaber – and the man who made it! – who saved your sorry hide two days ago?” 

 

“Two days?” 

 

“Yeah, Jaya.  Two days.” 

 

“Oh.”  She looked down at her feet for a moment.  “Zekk?”

 

“Yes, love?”  He pretended he didn’t notice her blanch at the nickname. 

 

“What happened out there?”

 

He sighed, and sat down in the chair next to her bed.  “Lay down, Jay, it’s a long story.”

  
  


*    *    *

 

“I guess I could blame you for the whole mission, Jay,” he started once Jaina had settled, and the Med Center people were gone.  “See, if you hadn’t run from the council and the rest of the Jedi, we wouldn’t be having this discussion right now…”

  
  


*       *    *

 

“And then I knew it was you, they had.  That dancer was a distraction, so those guards could get the ysalamari close enough to you to block your force presence from me.  It was a trap.  Hell, I knew it was a trap going in, but I also knew that it was one mission I had to take.  When I saw you there, Jay…” he trailed off in an attempt to control himself.  Slowly, as if to not wake her, he ran his fingers through her hair, a reassurance that she was in fact alive, and sleeping beside him.  He had no idea how long he had been talking, only that his wrist chrono said it was early morning, now.

 

“Oh, Jay, if only you knew…”  His iron will failed him finally, and the Jedi could no longer control the tears that raced freely down his face for the second time in three days.  His lack of control appalled him, but he knew this reaction was for Jaina, and her alone.  She stirred, and grabbed the hand that has been stroking her hair and squeezed it. 

The simple gesture undid Zekk.  He leaned over her now still frame, and softly kissed the top of her forehead. 

 

“I love you, Jaina,” he whispered, before falling asleep in his chair.

*          *          *

The next morning Jaina woke to a certain tall, dark haired, green eyed Jedi half sprawled across her bed, a hand entangled with one of hers. 

 

“Oh, Zekk,” she said softly, “what am I going to do with you?”  With a smile, she leaned over and kissed the top of his head before ruffling his hair.

“Wake up, flyboy.”

 

“Just five more minutes…”  Jaina laughed again.

 

She’d forgotten that Zekk hated being woken up before the sun, no matter what planet they were on, or how much sleep he’d had the night before. 

 

When Zekk fell back to sleep again, Jaina gave up.  She found the fresher that was connected to her room, and went in.  When she came out, Zekk was awake and watching her with weary eyes.

 

**“Hey, Jaya,” said Zekk, “You don’t remember any of last night?”**

 

**“No,” replied Jaina, giving him a sideways glance as she buckled her boot tight around her calf. “Why?”** _At least it wasn’t technically night he was talking about…_

 

**“No reason,” replied Zekk, smiling to himself. “No reason at all.”**

 

She watched him for a minute, her eyes dancing before she took his hand in hers. 


End file.
